Welcoming BP stations and leisurely hills

Well, I guess it was our fault for choosing to walk on a Bank Holiday Monday, but once again our walk started out in very grey conditions with the threat of rain.  At least our waterproofs are getting a good test.

With Tony off in Vienna (means nothing to me) the rest of Team Towis set off from Check Point 5, Washington.  We parked on the south bound side of the A24, then navigated the "danger, fast moving traffic", so we could follow the Trailwalker route through the grounds of the posh school, before re-crossing the A24 further south.   The track then zig zags a couple of times before heading up a long, steep at times, incline before reaching the "dew pond", where it levels before sloping gradually down towards Botolphs.

Last time we were up here the views were glorious, today cloud surrounded us, and the tracks almost blocked at times from puddles built up from the past two or three weeks of harsh drought conditions.

As we headed down the slope the rain started, at times cold and horizontal into the side of the face,  but it thankfully eased, along with the wind, as we got closer to the checkpoint.  The view opened out to show a meandering river heading south to the coastal town of Shoreham-by-Sea and north toward the small town of Upper Beeding ... a view topped off by a large Chapel perched on a nearby hill.  Even on this grey day all a fantastic sight, slightly ruined by a concrete monstrosity nestled into a quarry.

After passing the "rear entrances" of some well appointed, and huge, residences (the gates were really marked with signs saying "Rear Entrance") we reached "Pear Tree" cottage, the site of Check Point 6.  Here the Trail Walker route deviated from the South Downs way to take us safely under the A283, alongside the swollen river as the rain started lashing down again.  The route then takes a bizarre route through a housing estate which, with all the rain, gave a soaking sense of being lost as the rest of the route up to this point had been so isolated from civilisation.

As we left the houses we saw our first sign of a pub on the route (the Rising Sun) and, even more welcoming in the conditions, a BP garage with a coffee machine and a toilet!  A chance to warm up a bit and be tempted by the sausage roll selection.

As we departed the BP station and headed out of the village the rain persisted so we stopped to put the rain covers over our rucksacks apart from "Apollo" John who seemed to turn his into some kind of a space age satellite receiver system (well, his cover was silver and shiny) which at times inflated to look like a weather balloon.

Space man .. I always wanted to go into space man

Note Tony: don't read this next bit.

On leaving civilisation the TrailWalker route heads back to join the South Downs Way.  Unfortunately to do so involved the most evil hill we've encountered on the route so far, the kind that never seems to end, as you go round the bends it just seems to go up and up and up.  The surface was ok, being a tarmac road, but boy it was hard on the knees, and legs, and calves, and ankles.  It also made us feel grateful no-one had been tempted by a BP savoury treat, as it would either have weighed us down or been "deposited" somewhere on the way up.

Ok Tony, you can start reading again.

After rejoining the South Downs Way the track levels again, with the ground sloping away on both sides.  The view would probably be spectacular on a clear day but the clouds were closing in again, though there were a couple of sights enjoyed by some members of the team.  We walked on and reached a Youth Hostel (well, there was a slight detour in a local field due to our poor navigational skills and the fact people coming from the other direction were coming via the field) and sat and had a fairly civilised lunch around a picnic table.  Next week candles and cutlery.  With just under 2 miles to go to the checkpoint, but having walked for nearly 5 hours, we decided to turn round and head back.

On the way back the rain and wind picked up and we chose to follow the South Downs Way back rather than the, err, evil (Tony read "leisurely") hill.  This bought us to the A283 which we crossed and then immediately rejoined the TrailWalker route on the other side of the swollen river.

As we headed up the long, gentle slope, towards the Chanctobury Ring, the rain eased, the clouds cleared, and the view opened up again, making the walk more enjoyable (rather than the nagging doubt of "why am I doing this?" going through my mind for the past few hours).  Once again our immense sense of direction was shown as we all pointed toward the "Water Tank on the hill", "Chanctobury Ring" and all other markers we'd spotted in the other direction.  As we took a sharpish left we realised we were all pointing in completely the wrong direction.

Chanctobury Ring and blue skies!!

After passing the ring and the pond we again deviated from the official route, down the South Downs way, to return to our cars parked nearly 8 hours beforehand.

So we're maintaining our walks of around 20 miles or so - we now need to think about walking a bit further, training with the support crew and also walking at night.

Looking ahead, the next plan will be to pick up the route from Check Point 6 and hopefully walk all the way to Check Point 8 (Jack and Jill) as this seems to be just over 16k one way (10 mile) so fits in with our 20 mile standard.  Stage 8 to 9 looks like a walk on its own, being 13.8k one way and probably an hour and a half drive go get to.  But then we've covered pretty much the whole route - the last two checkpoints only cover 9.8k between them, so will be something to do to find the route but possibly closer to the event.  So we'll have the route walked and understood - just need to get our legs up to it!!


Date: 7 May 2012 8:56 am
Distance: 20.7 miles
Elapsed Time: 7:51:18
Avg. Speed: 2.6 mph
Max. Speed: 6.2 mph
Avg. Pace: 23' 31" per mile